Thursday, April 10, 2008

Hey, D-Bag

He goes on to complain about how much worse the pitching is doing this year.

First, this year: 4.71 ERA (before tonight's game). Last year, 4.58. Factor in RFK, and there's really not a damn bit of difference. It's the shame shitty pitching staff. What the fuck did he expect?

While he's at it, he damn well better release that loudmouth sack of shit, Lo Duca. The tramp-humper TALKS a good game, but unless he's going to load up his fat ass with more horse steroids, he can't hit or field worth a feckin crap. I was on the 'it's ok to go without Flores' bandwagon, but screw it. Cap'n SuckAss ain't cutting it.

81 Comments:

I'm not sure why Zimmerman and Kearns get the teflon treatment. True, pitching is the main problem, but when will we learn that Zimmerman IS NOT A #3 HITTER and Kearns SHOULD BE HITTING 6th at the highest. They are both around the Mendoza line and, in Kearns case, I am not sure why anyone even thinks he deserves to be a starter in this league, much less a #5 hitter!

Also, if I hear homer Carpenter whine one more time about Kearns not winning the gold glove last year and say how great a right fielder he is a will puke. For Christ's sake, the man is average at best in the field. Lopez should go, Zimmerman is a #5 hitter, and Kearns, if starting, should hit 6th or 7th. ... oh wait. That would be on a good team.

Welcome to the Keep Kid Flores, Drop PloD Club. Better late than never, Chris. The Kid is younger, quicker, better with the glove (already) and obviously a better hitter. Plus, he's clean. Even when PLoD makes decent contact (which isn't often) it's just warning-track power now. Wow. Imagine that? Now, what's the difference between this year and last? And who traded for this clod?

I like the vitriol!! The only way that the team is going to get the message that perpetual mediocrity is not okay with us is to tell them forcefully. Look what not really caring has got Cubs, Royals, and Brewers fans in the last twenty years. The Nats cannot get stuck in an Oriolesesque spiral of signing crappy vets to block young players for no reason.

Bowden and Kasten remind me of a Bill Clinton anecdote from several years ago: they'll shake your hand and smile while they're pissing down your leg. That's pretty much what those two are doing (minus the Clinton "charm") to this franchise and to us fans, and i'm sick of it. I like reading in the Post today that Bowden was having a "stern" talk after last nights game with Bergmann at his locker. Take that shit behind closed doors fuckwad. This pitching staff? It has YOUR fingerprints all over it. And Kasten talking about how he's "happy" about the 20,000 at the second game in the new park like we're supposed to buy it. Apparently he thinks we're all a bunch of idiots. We are, for forking over our hard earned money to watch this shitbag team and the shitbag pitching staff that has been assembled. I hope the fans continue to stay away from Nats Park this season, i really do. I hope we continue to lose, and draw 10k in the middle of the summer. Maybe then Uncle Teddy and Mark will wake up and smell the coffee. That this shit isn't acceptable for a major league franchise. Sorry for the rant, but i've just grown so tired of all of it.

The Orioles problem hasn't been their signing of crappy vets (though their ability to sign mediocrities like Marty Cordova is really quite astounding), but their complete inability to develop a farkin position player prospect.

Before Roberts and Markakis, had they developed anyone since Ripken in the early 80s?

Chris, I'm glad you've seen the light. While there might be some benefits gained from letting Flores play in the minors, that was NEVER the Nationals intention. If it was, they'd have demoted Flores at the beginning of the season and used Nieves as the back up.

Flores sure isn't a finished product, but at this exact moment in time he's at least as good as Estrada and Lo Duca.

Bowden just saw a window of opportunity to sign a well-known guy (too bad Lo Duca's reputation wasn't a positive one). Furthermore, it is absolutely OBVIOUS that Bowden did no research whatsoever when signing Lo Duca. If he did, he would have easily discovered that Lo Duca was not only mentioned in the Mitchell Report, but he was the fucking ringleader! PLoD was notified weeks before the Report came out, and surely he knew of his role in it all.If Bowden had even one ounce of sense in him, he'd have waited until the next day to announce the signing, which coincidentally was the day the Mitchell Report released! It's not like Bowden signed Lo Duca below market value. His value would have PLUMMETED if he hadn't signed this deal any later.Clearly, Lo Duca had no intentions of signing with the Nats. Rather, it was only the Nationals who offered him his asking price before the details of the Mitchell Report leaked. He knew the consequences, so he cut his losses, and grabbed the fattest deal he could get his grubby, greedy, self-centered HGH-enhanced hands on, before he was getting offered minor-league deals from other clubs.

Also, there's a reason why we signed Estrada for pocket-change. He's damaged goods. Other clubs wouldn't even waste a dime on him, so why did we sign him again?

Our GM is incompetent and a hypocrite. He uses the claim that he needs to give Flores more time in the minors- give the young guys more minor league experience. But when he doesn't have any other options, e.g. our pitching staff, he makes the claim that he doesn't want older pitchers getting in the way of the youthful pitchers- blood 'em into the staff as soon as possible (see: Ross Detwiler).

So now that Bowden's crowning achievement- the Majewski/Bray for Kearns/FLop/Wagner has turned into a surprisingly fair deal, what can JimBo fall back on? The Soriano/Young non-deals? They both worked out pretty well for us.

Another statement that really grinds my gears:"So I’m looking for pitchers that are going to stand up and get people out, keep us in ballgames"

I think part of the job detail for general manager probably includes something along the lines of "getting better pitching" which is usually followed with "in the off season".I guess he was too busy sipping mojitos, taking in the rays in Melbourne to be doing his job!

Or maybe he really thought Odalis Perez would solve all our pitching woes. If that's the case, then I'm dumbfounded.

On Zimmerman and Kearns, it might be that Zim isn't a true #3 hitter and Kearns is not a true #5 hitter, but it's not their fault that they are the best options we have for those spots in the order. Does ANYONE feel like the Nats have a reasonable chance to core when the part of the lineup due up doesn't include some portion of the 3-5 hitters? Me neither.

And anyone who thinks that Kearns is just an average fielder isn't paying attention.

last night in extra innings Cole Hamels laid down a dead bunt 5 feet from the plate. Schneider stumbled over to it just as Wright arrived, both bent down to pick it up simultaneously, but Wright had the better position to throw it immediately.

So Schneider plucked the ball up from the ground AND Wright's fingers, straightens up to throw, and slips. No play.

Anybody can slip, but he HAD to know that Wright could make a better throw; not laden with padding, standing facing the plate so his right handed throw was a natural. This shows poor judgement.

This will not appear in the box score and it didn't matter in the end, but visions of Schneider being some defensive god are overplayed.

Hey Nats VA,are you me? Couldn't have said it better myself.Wife, son (a Braves fan) and I are making the 130-mile trip for all three Braves games this weekend. Wife said last night while watching me react to that game: This weekend is going to be lots of fun.I'll probably ended up beating my son a few hundred times.

Plod is an overwieght, 35 year old catcher that can't seem to catch, can't throw, can't run, has questionable moral fiber, and irritates people in the club house. And, he is neck deep into horse racing, which I seem to recall is fueled by gambling. Would the Nats be worse off losing games with Flores? I say cut plod and flop and let somebody else play the game.

I was in the 300-level last night, but even from that far away Estrada looked like a freakin' clown. Who wears high socks with baggy-ass pants?Belliard hit a nice shot, too bad he sucked on D, even with playing in the shallow OF to compensate for having no range.Perez pitched great; he deserved more run-support.All in all, we still suck.Big donkey dick.

Of course, what makes JimBow's screed more ridiculous is his own history of throwing away serviceable pitchers through sheer stupidity (e.g. Darrell Rasner, Claudio Vargas, Tomo Ohka), along with his famous comment of, "You're supposed to run out of pitchers in September, not April."

Watch, Bergmann's going to pitch a couple of good games and the preening jackass is going to take credit for motivating him. Someone needs to shove that Segway up his ass -- which would also be down his throat at the same time.

"Almost every abat I have seen of Zimmerman this year ends up with a weak fly ball out to right."

Hmm, I guess you missed the rally killing double-play he hit into the night before.

But on other subjects -- I think many of us here are missing the point: we're still in the "rebuilding" stage. As I wrote in another thread, we have some awesome pitchers coming up through the minors -- it's just that they won't get here till 2009 or 2010. On top of that: Dukes, Milledge, Zimm, and Flores are all under 24.

So, why should the guys at the top spend big money now on some free agents that still won't make the Nats as good as the Mets, Braves, and Phils?

Look, MLB raped our team's future by killing the farm system, and you can't get it back overnight. Last year's draft for the Nats was the best of all 30 MLB teams. But those guys aren't going to play in the bigs for a few more years.

So, in the meantime, we get average pitchers (Odalis, et al) to "tread water" until our future stars are ready to blossom.

Rebuilding takes a few years -- and you can't buy a team into contention. That's the situation we're on.

As I wrote in another thread, we have some awesome pitchers coming up through the minors -- it's just that they won't get here till 2009 or 2010. On top of that: Dukes, Milledge, Zimm, and Flores are all under 24.

So, why should the guys at the top spend big money now on some free agents that still won't make the Nats as good as the Mets, Braves, and Phils?

Because 80% of us turn into average pitchers or no MLB pitchers at all?

We have the following solid pitching prospects (I'm sure some of the following will be solid starters in the majors in 1-2 years or worthwhile trade bait): Detwiler, Jordan Zimmermann, Smoker, Balester, Willems, McGeary, Shairon Martis.

We also have some solid hitters: Burgess, Maxwell, Smolinski, Daniel, and Rhinehart.

Not all are awesome, but taken as a group, it looks pretty good that _some_ will blossom well.

And, again, Dukes is only 23 and Milledge 22. Even Zimmerman is still only 23. Jesus Flores has obviously large up-side potential.

My point is this: with all the youngsters we have already in the majors, and the number of solid prospects we have -- I expect that things will look far better in 2009 or 2010. Certainly, the odds are that of all the pitchers I just mentioned, many will be better than the starting five we currently have!

Certainly, none of the players I mentioned are a lock to be a star, or even to be a solid MLB starter -- but between all of them, some will indeed pan out, and be able to pitch in the majors with an ERA better tahn 4.50

What you have not named there is an absolute blue chip prospect. Milledge is great but we'd trade him for Ellsbruy in a second. Same is true of Flores and various catchers; Dukes and half of all outfielders named Young/Upton; Zimmerman and other hot young third basemen. As for our pitching staff, None of these guys (except Detwelier) make it into the top 25 prospects in the league. We have a lot of average and nothing that makes a franchise team.

Not to bash the farm system, they've done great work but, it punches a hole in the clogging the paths argument. Clogging the path for who? Garret Mock? Michael Burgess? Esmylam Gonzalez? Sacrifice all ability to compete on the long shot that these guys come good. Talent is called talent because people MIGHT come good. A truly gifted player forces his way in and you trade off the man in his way.

And Bowden can kiss my unmentionables!!! How dare he criticize the pitchers. We all knew they weren't really up to scratch. They may suck but they are all doing their best! They aren't to blame for not being able to cut it, HE is for sticking them in a the show. Jackass!!! On you segway and go!

Chris:A wise a bitter blogger not a thousand miles from this site did once tell me that revenue is calculated on a season by season basis. Which makes you wonder what they are saving money for? Why not pay a few Lohse's and the like for the year?

Right now now we are clogging the path of Lanna with Chico, Ballister with Redding. Say what you like about whether these guys will ever be good enough, we could at least put more sevicable shlubs in their way.

Ah, this is just pain talking. I agree with giving whichever kids we have chance to see who swim and who sinks. It'll make for a better organisation. It just sucks right now.

Chris writes: "The team DOES have enough revenue to put a better product on the field. They just don't think it's a smart business decision. And in some ways, they're right."

That makes sense to me. Why spend a lot of money so we can compete for third place?

On the other hand, as many here have said, the corollary ought to hold true: if you're not going to spend money, you shouldn't also gouge the customers.

And I also agree that criticizing the very pitching staff that one has assembled is really stupid. It's not like the pitchers aren't trying, it's just that they don't have the talent (or are being put into the wrong role).

As for Ben's comment: I am more optimistic about the farm system, particularly the pitchers. For example: three starting pitchers from Vermont made that league's all star team. Two are at Potomac, and one was traded for Dukes. One of them (Jordan Zimmerman) had an impressive debut at Potomac this week. (As did Detwiler for that matter).

There's just so much one can do. Baseball America gave the Nats "Best Draft" in 2007 Major League Draft Report Card, that's not nothing. They picked and signed four of the top 30 available, and eventually signed all 20 of their first 20 picks.

But best draft of 2007, even if all the potential does pan out, doesn't mean we'll see any results on the MLB level till 2009 or 2010.

And that's my bottom line point: These things take time. After what MLB did to the Nats, of course they're going to suck for a while -- even if we have the smartest owners on the planet. People expecting results for this season are unable to see the bigger picture here.

DC Wonk--here here. Building from the wreckage of the Monopolist League Baseball's purposeful destruction of this franchise will take longer than 1 draft and 2 off seasons.

Bud Selig and the Conspiracy of 29 is to blame for the current talent-level of this franchise, and no combinations of moves or signings could have turned this team into a winner in the time Kasten's been in charge.

I'm not saying they should be immune from criticism (and I find more fault in the money they've spent than what they haven't, esp. DY and Belliard's contracts), but the overwhelming majority of the blame for the state of our team goes to Selig, Loria, Angelos, Minaya, et. al. And they did it ON PURPOSE.

To again try to quantify the extent to which our team was "raped" (as DC Wonk says, a perhaps too mild choice of words I think), here are the season-to-date stats on some of the key players the Monopolist Baseball League looted from our franchise while colluding to eliminate it:

(Again, the point here isn’t that all these players would be with the Nationals if not for Monopolist Baseball League’s collusive effort to destroy our franchise--though they could be, since none of them other than Vladdy carries a particularly high salary number, it’s an impossible hypothetical. The point is that we went from quite a lot of talent to the perhaps the worst talent top-to-bottom of any team in league history while being owned and operated by and for the benefit of our 29 opponents. Nats fans need to understand how we got here—it took years for Selig, Loria, Angelos, and the rest of the Conspiracy of 29 to destroy this franchise and it’ll take more than one draft and two off-seasons to rebuild.)

Ben, I don't know if I agree. I would put Ellsbury and Milledge at about the same. I would also say we would have probably have 7 guys in the BA top 100 if we were called the Red Sox, Braves, or Yanks.

Are guys are so young that they don't rank in the top 100 yet, but overall we are #9 because of the upside of our "blue-chippers".

I would consider Detwiler, Balester, Smoker, McGeary, Zimmerman, Marrero, and Burgess all blue-chippers. If these guys all develop like they are supposed to, I see them all (except for maybe McGeary because of his situation right now) in the top 100.

I didn't say the farm system was bad. And it is rapidly improving. I just don't see a poster child for the organisation down there.

I like the old Expos tactic of focusing very heavily so the Dominican so the DR league thing is fantastic. All I was saying is that the depth of our woes has affected how we think of this farm system. We have done amazingly but, there is still a very long way to go, and the farm has not been rebuilt enough for us to be leaning on it as heavily as we are going to have to this season.

And I'll also admit that I think the patience approach is a lot better, and smarter Wonk. It just hurts.

But that's not how the game is played. Even if MLB didn't fuck over the Expos, you can't assume that the team would still have ALL those players. EVERY team loses good players.

The only move that you can directly attribute to MLB is the Colon trade. Guerrero couldv'e just as easily walked with the Lerners in charge as Loria or Selig.

A few other teams gave up on Phillips and Bay along the way, too. So it's definitely not fair to blame that entirely on MLB. (With Vidro in tow, there's no way the Nats would've kept Phillips around anyway)

(And Orlando Hudson was never an Expo. He was drafted and traded by the Blue Jays)

you CAN blame MLB for the shoddy drafting performance over the last 5-7 years. but the argument you're making now, is a bit faulty.

I think different folks have different ideas of what exactly are "blue-chippers".

In my opinion, a blue-chipper is a no doubt about it future key contributor. These are guys that are coveted by other teams. Jay Bruce, Clayton Kershaw, Joba Chamberlain, & Clay Buchholz are examples. The Nationals have exactly one of those, Ryan Zimmerman.

All of the other guys mentioned here are solid guys but they have questions that need to be answered

Folks can be excited about them but still need to realize that more of these guys flame out than ever make it to the majors.

I'd imagine the Nationals would be ecstatic if they could get 4 contributors from each draft. I'm not talking stars or even regular starters, I'm talking guys who can stick on the 25-man roster.

Oops I meant Orlando Cabrera. I always mix them up. He left after Bud refused to allow the team to expand its roster for the stretch run in 2003. He said he would have liked to stay and make another run at it, but that MLB's efforts to destroy the franchise convinced him to leave. Not his words exactly, but that was his point.

In Guerrero's case, how can you not blame MLB? They refused to allow the team to even try to re-sign him, and didn't even allow the team to offer him arbitration to get the compensatory picks! Those picks could have yielded talent that would be coming up now. You spend time fretting that we didn't offer Kip Wells a deal, but want to dismiss that?

I'm sorry, but it seems like you don't get it. The point, as I said in my post, isn't that any one of these particular players would be on our team now had Loria not sold out to the Conspiracy of 29, it's that we had a lot of talent and by the time the team arrived in DC we had none. Zero. A total desert. BA ranked us 30 out of 30 and Mike Hinckley and Larry Broadway were our top prospects.

You seem to want us to think that the Expos/Nationals are just another struggling franchise that made some bad decisions and now need to rebuild. That's just not right. Our opponents conspired to destroy us, and I for one am going to nurture my resentment towards the actual bad guys.

I should say there is one team who I exempt partially from my desire for vengeance--the Twins. The state stood up to MLB (too bad Williams and Cropp weren't paying attention) and stopped the monopolists from eliminating them by suing to force the team to play out their lease in the Humptydome. Needing 2 teams to destroy our franchise to maintain an even number of teams, the Twins rescued us, kind of like the Obi Wan Kenobi to Bud Selig's Darth Sidius.r

Man, if you believe that Twins claptrap, I'm not sure I can help you! :)

the state didn't have to do a damn thing. "Contraction" was never a serious thing. It was a bargaining ploy by MLB, an attempt to strongarm more concessions out of localities and the players association.

How else should we attempt to quantify the damage done than to look at that state of the organization before and after MLB ownership than to compare the assets before and after their reign of destruction?

I've never really gotten the LoDuca signing. He's clearly past his prime and I'd rather go with Flores and a cheaper Estrada.

But I don't have a lot of complaints about not signing a money pitcher. I'm glad management ponied up for McGeary, which is more important than throwing money to a Weaver/Lohse.

The problem is that the team is hoping to ride the off-field hype long enough for the on-field talent to arrive. So far that bet isn't paying off. And besides the Flores situation, making PDL a spokesman/key player for the team saps some goodwill. You don't even get to root for a plucky underdog loser when PDL comes to the plate.

Let's say I as a fan want to complain that we should have signed Soriano to more money than the Cubs gave him. You'd say, correctly, that would have been idiotic. He's already not worth that kind of money, and by the time he's 37 he'll be total dead weight. But at least if I held that dumb opinion I could blame Bowden, Kasten, and the Lerners.

But if I as a fan want to complain that the prior regime should have resigned Vladdy, or not traded Grady, or held onto Chris Young, whom do I blame for that? I can't blame Omar for not signing a guy that the league refused to allow him to negotiate with, or for being the only GM in the league operating under a salary cap.

You've already acknowledged that Grady can be laid at the feet of MLB. So let's just stop there. Right now, he'd be far and away the best player on our team, the face of the franchise, clearly superior to Zimmerman in most every phase of the game, a real difference-maker. And teams do NOT give away blue-chip talent like that "all the time." That alone should be enough to inspire the red hot fury of 1000 suns.

Vladdy--baseball's financial/competitive imbalance surely would have kept him from resigning with us. But who's fault is it that we have a system that allows the Yankees and the Red Sox to buy up all the talent and keeps the Pirates, Royals, and Expos of the world under their heel? The same people I've been ranting about all along.

Chris Young? Fine, blame Omar for just being an idiot. But he ran the team with contraction 1-2 years away. Only an idiot would preach patience when the team has a year-to-year lease on its freaking turf.

If your team leaders are smart and competent, you'll win eventually. Yes, that even goes for us now.

_________

OK, again I'm sorry, but you really don't get it. If you think this accurately describes how the Expos went from being one of the better minor league systems in baseball in the late 90s and early 00s and a wild card contender in 2003 to the absolute desolation of talentless desolation that arrived in DC 2 years later, then really you don't get it.

Anyone ever notice how the Marlins don't suck quite as bad as they're supposed to? It's cuz they actually KEEP some of those high draft picks they get from being shitty most years. They have "blue-chip" guys ready to learn on an MLB level, and we don't. All of our good prospects are still in A or AA ball.Therefore, it becomes the responsibility of Jim "Blowjob" Bowden and company to put a watchable product on the field.Hence, we need to spend more on FAs. Why does he not know how to do his fucking job?

I know, it was sort-of supposed to be rhetorical.I just don't get how they don't go after some free-agents to make us half-way decent. I say 'watchable' and not 'competitive' because I'm being realistic.It's fucked up that they tell us to wait for these young guys to become stars, but still want to make major-market profits off the team, and at the same time run it like a small-market team.They can't have it both ways. or maybe they can since suckers like me will still buy the tix and beer :)

For all the people wanting us to blow the bank on FAs, let's imagine, hypothetically, that we signed ALL the free agents out there. Every single guy available, and go with the pick of the litter. Totally ridiculous (unless you're Dan Snyder I guess), but let's just imagine, how good would we be if we could do that. Here's the FAs who signed for the MOST money in annual salary (since spending is clearly the gauge of success):

So what does that get you? A nice outfield, sure, but no SP better than a 3 (if that) and a weak infield. *Maybe* you make the playoffs because the NL sucks, but you really have no chance to contend with this group.

And don't forget we have to fire all the scouts, never pay above slot for any draft picks, and don't expect to sign another FA for a decade or more.

To play Devil's Advocate here, you spend money because you have very little of a public foundation for your club, and spending money and making the team better (even incrementally so) gets people talking and interested. (And, as Chris says, we all know they have the money to do this, that, and the other now.)

The "Why compete for third place?" line of reasoning makes a lot of sense when Baseball Prospectus uses it in those econ breakdowns of cost per win and which range of wins is the most efficient for the cost and all that.

But the Nationals might be a little different, at least in some ways. There's no history, no foundation for this Nationals team, and there's no real reason to come out to the ballpark except for the ballpark itself. If you construct, say, an 82-86 win team, then that team might be irrelevant ultimately when we're discussing the Nats' first true contender, but it builds a foundation for expecting pretty good baseball on show for the locals.

(Of course, the Lerners are making money as it is, so that's one reason why they're operating now is a good business decision. And, yes, the organization absolutely has done great work on the farm in a short time. To their credit.)

Thanks for your thoughtful comments to "why spend lots of money for a 3rd place team."

I think you presented a good case, and, frankly, I think reasonable minds can disagree -- i.e., I think a decent case can be made for spending that money and/or not spending it.

But, as steven pointed out, spending lots of money on FA's isn't necessarily going to get us too many more wins, and those who stamp their feet wondering why we don't have a good team right now this instant have lost perspective.

But we will continue to look like a small market (attendance/revenue-wise) until this team can generate some buzz.With the current line up we have, there won't be any buzz for another AT LEAST 5 years. Detwiler and whatever other pitching prospects we have in the minors aren't going to pitch like All-Stars for their first few years of major league experience. They will need at least two years (it took Peavy and Santana 3 years before they reached their potential) to come into their own. As it is, Detwiler, the most big-league ready of our prospects is still at least a year off. The others will probably take another 3 years before we see them in the starting rotation.

In the meantime, we've gotta sign a couple players to create a bit of buzz for the team. Right now, to the casual fan, the Nats are a terrible team not worth supporting. If we could put up a .500 season, while it wouldn't give us a realistic shot of making the playoffs, it would provide some excitement to the non-devoted fans.

We can still sign experienced big-league players without compromising our future. And even if there is a player blocking a prospects path, then let the prospect prove he should start. If it comes down to trying to figure out whether Ronnie Belliard would bring more to the team than this prospect in the immediate and long-term future, then maybe this prospect probably isn't very good anyway.

To further elaborate on what Basil said, spending the money for an 83-win team has one more advantage -- it provides the chance of catching lightning in a bottle. There's always the chance that everything breaks right, your division competition has some off-years, and your team with "83-win" talent puts up 90 wins and gets into the post-season (cf. Colorado Rockies, Arizona Diamondbacks).

Even if you get a 79-win team rather than an 83-win team it still makes a difference to spend the money to improve from the 73-win team, because it means the team is likely to improve its home record from .480 to .530. Having a better-than-even chance of seeing a win if you go to the game makes it much more likely for the marginal fan to go to the game.

It is worth the money to replace Odalis Perez with Kyle Lohse. Or another way to look at it would be sign Lohse, put Bergmann in the bullpen, and in effect have Lohse replace Hanrahan. You don't go crazy and sign 7 big ticket free agents, but you do shore up your weakest areas with competent replacements.

Basil-I think you clarified the point I was trying to make best.I DON'T think we should blow the bank on FAs. What I believe, and what I've been saying since this off-season, is that we should at least make an attempt to be taken seriously. I don't expect a jump to contender, but I would at least like to know that the money I spend going to the park will be returned in some form in the on-field product.Just because this city went without baseball for a long time, it doesn't give ownership the right to insult it's supporters by trotting a pile of shit out on the field and expect us to be content with 'wait 'till next year.

Funny thing is, a few years ago an 83 win team won the World Series: The '06 Cardinals.

I'd rather have a glimmer, no matter how faint it is, for, say, ten million more bucks than under-performance and promises for a better tomorrow that involve spending that same money on cashmere coverlets for the crappers in the presidential suites instead.

What if we added Lohse and Weaver? Or Livan and Colon? We could have had one of those guys for the combined cost of Belliard and Dmitri's contracts this year.